Anthony Abeykoon

Senior Fellow

Dr. A. T. P. L. Abeykoon is a Senior Fellow at the Institute for Health Policy (IHP). Prior to joining IHP he was the Director of the Population Division in the Ministry of Healthcare and Nutrition. He holds a Masters degree in Population and Development from Cornell University and a M.S. and Ph.D. in Population Planning from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, USA.

A demographer by training, Dr. Abeykoon has served in the Ministries of Economic Planning, Plan Implementation and Health for 38 years, specialising in the field of population. He was the President of the Population Association of Sri Lanka during 1998 to 2002. During 2009 to 2010 he served as the Secretary General of the Asian Population Association. His research has been published in local and international journals, and he has undertaken evaluations of projects for the ILO/IPEC, UNIFEM and the UNDP. He was the Lead Evaluator of the Asia-Pacific Population Journal published by UNESCAP since 1986.

Dr. Abeykoon has a wide range of experience as a consultant. He was a Consultant to the Planning Commission of the Government of Bangladesh and to the National Commission on Family Planning, Government of Vietnam, and a short term Consultant to the Population Division of UN ESCAP. He was a visiting lecturer at the Post Graduate Institute of Medicine and at the Department of Demography, University of Colombo. Dr. Abeykoon is a Member of the UNFPA Asia-Pacific Regional Advisory Group. He also functions as a Member of the Editorial Boards of the International Journal of MCH and AIDS, and The Asia Pacific Population Journal.

Dr. Abeykoon has served in a number of Technical Committees including the Demographic and Health Surveys of 1993 and 2000. In his capacity as the Director of the Population Division, he was the Project Coordinator of a number of UNFPA funded projects. He is also an adjudicator for Ph.D. Thesis of candidates at the Universities of Colombo and Ruhuna in Sri Lanka and at Sri Venkateswara University, Andra Pradesh, India.